ILIAS Biologics’ exosomes for sepsis; plus regulating cocaine seeking and a new COVID-19 target

Relieving sepsis-related organ damage
An ILIAS Biologics Inc. and Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology team described in Science Advances a sepsis treatment comprising exosomes loaded with a “super repressor” NF-κB inhibitor: a dominant active NFKBIA mutant. In mice modeling lethal sepsis, the exosomes reduced sepsis-induced renal injury, serum levels of inflammatory cytokines and the mortality rate. ILIAS holds IP related to the work.

Regulating cocaine seeking
Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai researchers have described a new epigenetic modification -- dopamine attachment to histone H3 -- and showed that preventing this change in the midbrain could treat cocaine addiction. Reported in Science, they found more dopamine modifications in the midbrain of rats undergoing cocaine withdrawal. Midbrain overexpression of an H3 variant that can’t receive the epigenetic change, a way to reduce levels of dopaminylation, reversed gene expression changes associated with withdrawal and reduced dopaminergic neuronal activity and drug-seeking behavior...